My new roommate and I stare at each other. She pops another fried meatball into her mouth, chewing loudly without breaking eye contact until eventually, she swallows.
"Want one?" she asks, holding out one of the morsels to me.
"Oh, um, no thank you," I tell her.
She nods and slurps it down, continuing to lie on her side and stare at me with half-lidded eyes. The room is pretty small, containing two beds, two nightstands, and very little else. There are drawers under the bed frame, one of which is haphazardly ajar and full of what I can only assume are my roommate’s clothes. An open trunk, containing nothing but a single pair of undergarments, takes up a significant percentage of what little floor space lies between the beds.
"Are you just going to stand there, or...?"
I flick my eyes back towards my roommate, a blush eating my cheeks.
"I, uh, I'm not sure where to sit," I manage.
"Well, this is my bed," she says slowly, indicating the very thing she is currently lounging upon. "So presumably, that would be your bed."
I glance at the yet-untouched piece of furniture and nod slowly. Awkwardly, I walk over and gingerly sit down, paying careful attention to the feeling of my quills scraping against the grooves they've already dug into the inside of my armor. My oversized plate does a pretty decent job of giving them enough room to not stab out of the bottom when I sit down, but I know that if I flex or extend them even a little bit they will shear right through the back and expose me. They also still make sitting uncomfortable, so I carefully copy my roommate's lounging pose instead.
We return to staring at each other.
"So…" the freckled young woman says. "You need help moving any of your stuff in?"
"My… stuff?" I ask. What the heck kind of stuff is she talking about?
"You know like… your things? Things that you own?"
"Oh, I don't have any," I tell her.
"Oh."
She munches down another meatball. I really, really hope that Galdra won't forget to set up food for me every day.
"Well, I'm Gina," my roommate tells me. "Nice to meet you or whatever."
"O-oh! Sorry, I'm so rude!" I stammer quickly. I can't believe I forgot to introduce myself! "My name is Lark. It's nice to meet you, Gina."
She nods in acknowledgment, popping down yet another little meat-morsel.
"Are you like, going to take that armor off, or…?"
"No," I tell her.
A silence stretches between us once again, the weight of social awkwardness ever-multiplying.
"Okay," Gina eventually allows.
With the conversation concluded, it quickly becomes apparent that I have nothing to do. I'm fairly certain that I'm supposed to just wait until training starts, whenever that is, so I descend into torpor and let time start to flow by. Torpor is an interesting experience, one that I've had to describe a few times for human friends back in my village. I can only assume that my explanations are about as unilluminating as the descriptions they gave me for dreaming and sleep, two things that I have never and likely will never experience. I am still awake during torpor, still aware, and once it ends I can look back at my memories of the experience and recall everything that occurred. Yet during a torpor I do not really think. My mind simply stops, resting whatever parts of it make up me while still remaining alert to danger. My torpor will end if I am disturbed, or if I smell something strange, or if a loud noise happens nearby. Some part of me is also dimly aware on a conscious level, and can choose to end the experience. Perhaps a good way to describe it is like meditation, but rather than a skill I have built over the course of my life it is something that comes to my body naturally. I mainly use it to accelerate my perception of time, and it is for that use I apply it now.
"Yo, Lark, did you die?" Gina asks me what I estimate to be about sixteen and a half hours later.
"Huh?" I ask, snapping back to myself. "Oh, no, sorry. I was... resting."
Now that I think about it, throughout my entire torpor I have been staring directly at Gina's bed. I, um, hope she's not too weirded out by that. I've noticed that humans don't like being stared at for extended periods of time.
"Yeah, okay. Well, there's like, a package for you. The delivery person was pretty insistent I come get you for it."
"Oh!" I say, my armor clattering as I quickly get to my feet. "Thank you. Sorry about that."
I carefully step around her and rush out the door, my sense of smell immediately guiding me towards what I can only assume to be my package. An annoyed-looking messenger stands in the front room of the barracks and holds a box, which they hand to me after I confirm that my name is Lark. Then I quickly rush to the bathroom, because I'm not sure where else I can get the privacy required to remove my helmet and eat.
"Why did it have to be mice?" I grumble to myself, making sure the outhouse is securely locked before I remove the box's lid.
Inside are four comatose field mice, and merely looking at them has my mind flashing back to that horrible final moment with Vita where she somehow stuffed what remained of my father into a rodent just like these and convinced me to swallow him. It tasted far too good, a flavor I will never be able to get out of my mind. I know these creatures will be nothing like that experience, but I still stare at them with both a primal anticipation and a full-bodied loathing.
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I drop them down my throat, because as much as I find the act a self-inflicted torture, eating mice that remind me of a person is better than going hungry and actually eating a person. I resecure my helmet and exit the lavatory, making my way back towards my room. I run into Gina along the way, however, idling in a common room to which most of the dorm hallways connect. With her are a number of other humans that I assume are other trainees, and as I pass my eyes over the group my heart drops into my infinite void of a stomach as I recognize one of them. I can't believe this. Surely someone or something is having a laugh at my expense.
"Yo, Lark," Gina calls out, waving me over. "Quit being a weirdo and introduce yourself."
I flinch at the sound of my own name, not wanting it to enter the ears of those present, but I do as she requests. I introduce myself in sequence to all the people here. A thin fellow with curly light brown hair, a stout-looking tan young man, an older man with greying hair, and…
“Bently,” Bently introduces himself. “It’s nice to meet you.”
Beneath my helmet I lick my lips, the memory of his exquisite-tasting flesh burning brightly in my mind.
"Y-yeah," I agree. "It's nice to, um, get formally introduced."
"Ha ha, yeah!" he agrees jovially. "You know, it's funny. I used to be a hunter before this, and I actually went on two missions to deal with a monster that ended up being named 'Lark.'"
"Uh. Yep."
Does he not recognize my voice…? I guess I've kind of changed a lot, and Lark is a human name, but surely he is at least a little suspicious?
"I was a hunter too, actually," Gina volunteers.
"Oh! We should do like, a whole meet and greet!" the thin man declares. “Where we come from, what our talents are, all that stuff! I’ll go first! My name is Xavier and I have a kineticism talent that only works on water! I’ve never been anything cool like a hunter before, but my Preacher said that my talent is super strong and I should join the Templars! Um… I like stories! Okay, who’s next?”
A powerful talent, huh? He certainly smells really strong, I'll give him that. Physically, though, he looks kind of out of shape, the sort of meal that won't survive many bites. …Not that I should be thinking of people that way, but I guess that's my frame of reference. I force my brain to make a better comparison: despite being an adult, he has the physique of one of the children in the village who haven't been set to manual labor yet.
"Harvey," the next man grunts. He's got an interesting collection of scars, a shaved head and piercing green eyes. He smells powerful, and clearly has a lot of delicious muscle on his bones. "Former tactical officer for the Valkian army, honorably discharged to transfer to the Templars. Offensive wide-range kynamancy talent. I guess my hobby would be… painting? But I'm shit at it."
"Language," I whisper, but everyone ignores me.
"I'm Bently!" the huge young man reminds everyone. "I was a hunter! Then I stopped for a while, because some really serious things happened on a bad job. One of my teammates turned out to be an animancer and… killed my friend."
“Holy fuck,” Gina says. “Oh, holy fuck, I remember you! Weren’t you on the blue girl’s team? Watcher’s eyes, was she…?”
“Yeah,” Bently confirms. “Yeah, it was bad. I didn’t know what to do for a while, but I decided that I want to stop people like that from doing more harm, so I applied for the Templars.”
“Shit. I can’t believe we were so close to an animancer that whole fucking time.”
“Language,” I say again.
It’s one thing for a High Templar to swear, but these people are trainees like me! What if a bunch of children listen to Templars with potty mouths?
"Okay goody two shoes, you introduce yourself then," Gina grunts. "Who's behind that helmet, huh?"
"Is it true that you've never taken your armor off?" Xavier asks, eyes nearly sparkling.
I squirm uncomfortably under the attention, not entirely sure what to say.
"I… I'm Lark," I tell them again. "I'm supposed to keep the armor on all the time. Sorry."
"Why's that?" Xavier presses. "Why did you join the Templars? What's your talent? Where do you come from?"
I take a nervous step backwards.
"Um, I… is it okay if I don’t say?" I ask.
“I mean, I guess you don’t have to,” Xavier says, clearly unhappy about it, “but everybody else is sharing and we’re going to be training together for months so I figure we should know each other.”
Oh no! No, don’t give me a disappointed face like that! I don’t want to be seen as mean for not doing what everyone else is doing, but what do I say?
"I just… I’m a criminal, I guess,” I admit. “I did a bunch of terrible things and I joined the Templars to atone. I’m supposed to keep the armor on so that nobody recognizes me. Uh. I like flowers. And I'm not sure if it's a talent, but I have a perfect memory?"
"Woah," Xavier says. "That's fucking cool. What crimes did you commit?"
“I… they weren’t cool,” I tell him firmly. “I don’t want to say.”
“Redemption stories are cool,” Xavier insists.
"Woah, hey, you don't have to room with her," Gina complains. "Now I’m going to be worried about whatever the fuck it is she did."
"I promise I won't hurt you," I tell her.
"Damn, I feel so much better," Gina answers, dripping with sarcasm. "Whatever. I'm a former hunter too. I don't have any fancy fucking talents, but I'm a damn good enhancer. I move fast and I hit hard."
"Like senior hunter Remus?" Bently asks her.
"Yeah," Gina confirms. "He taught me."
“He taught me too!” Bently says happily. “Well, I guess mostly he just kicked me a lot.”
“I mean, that’s training.”
“No, it isn’t,” Harvey grunts.
"I'm Melik," the tan, stout man suddenly interrupts, “and I’m from Litia Village. The Templars are the only place I can use my talent. That’s all I want to say.”
Melik is shorter than any of the rest of us, and he looks a bit younger than the others as well, but he's incredibly broad-shouldered and likely outweighs Xavier and I. Of course, I'm actually a bit lighter than a human my size even counting all my extra body parts, likely due to the katzels I ate so much of when I was small. Being light has its upsides and downsides; it’s mainly good because it allows me to change direction more easily even at the incredible speeds I can reach, but it has the problem of making any attacks I land not hit as hard as they could if I was a more normal weight. This hardly matters when I'm just using my teeth on things, but that's unlikely to be an option while I'm pretending to be human. When I killed my brother because he was attacking Eun a year ago, I probably could have twisted his entire head off rather than only breaking his neck if I just had a bit more momentum behind me. Which, you know, would’ve made quite the difference.
I’m pretty sure my kind can’t survive decapitation. Pretty sure.
We all chat for a while after that, by which I mostly mean everyone else chats and I am also there. I enjoy listening, though, and nobody seems outwardly opposed to my presence which is good enough for me. My village was a wonderful place. I have so many happy memories that I don't deserve from all the times I played with Eun's kids, learned weaving techniques from her father, or stayed up late at night while she was drunk and listened to her talk about her late husband. I hope they are all doing okay without me.
Later that night, we are given our instructions on where and when to arrive for our first training session. In the barracks yard by first light. Easy enough. I recall how long tonight's island darkens the sky, and resolve to torpor until an hour beforehand.
Time passes me by, and my first day in the barracks completes without incident.